The person makes it sound like an eternity and well, when we are still in our late teens or early twenties, four or five years is a long time. After all, it represents a full 20 to 25 percent of the time we have been in existence. Actually, since we can’t remember years one to four much at all, the time represents upwards of 35 percent of our life to date.

Of course, the older folks chuckle at our incredibly naive view. This past week it was easy to understand why.

Together Forever?

It was the kind of news that spread like internet virus. Touching and amazing all at the same time.

It seems that Britain’s current longest married couple recently came to the “death do us part” stage of their marriage. On September 1st, at the ripe old age of 101, Frank Milford of Plymouth went to meet his maker.

That meant his wife Anita was now on her own for the first time in 81 years.

Yep, 81 years.

According to the BBC, the couple met at a YMCA dance in Plymouth, Devon, in 1926. Two years later they took their vows.

The closest they likely came to being separated was during World War II. Again, according to the BBC, “during the Blitz they narrowly escaped two bombs, including one which fell on their house.”

The incredibly sweet couple acknowledged their secret – the Milfords’ insisted their marriage was one of “give and take” and a little time for some romance. They were still together in an assisted living center at the time of Frank’ death.

While one might be astonished by the incredible length of time the couple had been together, it seems they fell short of becoming the longest married couple in Britain. Mr. and Mrs. Milford would have had to spend another six months together, until February of 2010, to claim the longest British marriage ever, a mark held by Thomas and Elizabeth Morgan of Caerleon, South Wales, a total of 81 years and 60 days (Guinness World Records).

After learning about the cart at Gizmodo, we had to call our readers’ attention to Guan’s whimsical attempt to strap a set of large nickel cadmium batteries and a massive brushless motor to a derelict shopping cart. But our own fascination with technology and moving vehicles had us yearning for more – we simply had to hear firsthand from the creator himself.

So we spent some time with Charles, he of the web site Equals Zero with URL etotheipiplusone.net (yes, that’s Euler’s Identity buried in his call letters), discussing his recent fame, the MIT campus culture and his desire to construct something, anything when given such wonderful parts. We think you will enjoy some of the lessons Charles has learned from constructing the LOLrioKart including dealing with steering slop, his Fred Flinstone braking system and the initial construction of a vehicle featuring only two speeds, zero and fast.

The folks at Gizmodo gave you some great publicity but they also called you a nerd on their site (seeing a motorized shopping cart with a nerd inside tooling around on the street). Are you OK with that, I mean their site is read by somewhere near a gazillion readers?

Pop culture comes up with new ways to describe “someone smarter or craftier than you” every once in a while, but the classics seem to be ‘nerd’ and ‘geek’. Besides the occasional (and inevitable) grade school hijinks, I don’t recall ever really being victimized or shunned when referred to in that fashion. Part of getting over that is acknowledging the reality of the game – that what you do or who you are is not what the majority of people are used to. It’s useless to be sensitive about every descriptive term that comes your way, especially since they evolve so quickly, and people are multifaceted enough that anyone could come up with a word and pretend it’s derogatory or obscene. I mean, just take a look at the sheer number words that we have turned into sexual slang.

Speaking of which, just make sure you’re careful to not call someone a dork. In reality, you are indicating that they are a whale penis. Whales tend to be larger than you in every single way. I’ve been unwittingly complimented in this fashion many times.

Just so we know, what in your eyes is the difference between a geek and a nerd – does it have anything to do with the desire to strap technology to something that moves?

I have never really discerned between ‘geek’ and ‘nerd’. The running joke between my friends years ago was that a geek was someone skilled or passionate in a specific, tangible field of interest or hobby – computer geek, band geek, robot geek, etc. the list goes on. We sort of chose to designate “nerds” as being the underclass – those who are incredibly, almost frighteningly smart, but in a purely academic sense.

This definition is clearly not the universal one, some may argue it’s the exact reverse, but you know what? I don’t really care. Labeling me as one thing or another doesn’t really impact how I do things, and it shouldn’t affect you either.

Can you talk a bit about your first “attempt to strap a massive brushless motor to something?” I believe you called the electric vehicle: Snuffles the First?

Back in the summer of 2007, I came back from a trip to China with what I considered at the time to be “exotic equipment” – that is, brushless motors, precision-made actuators, lithium batteries, etc. The stuff that R/C hobbyists used to drop big money on but is now incredibly affordable, except my version of “affordable” was an order of magnitude or two lower. Keep in mind that for years before this I’d been hacking together robots with cordless drill, remote control toy, appliance, and other random parts, so this was pretty damned exciting.

One of these “exotic” parts was a large model airplane electric motor. Better-made equivalents from the depths of Germany and Switzerland are used to fly electric models with wingspans of 20 or more feet. Absolutely enormous. I didn’t really have anything that large (or really anything) to fly, so I sort of mulled over it wondering what I should do.

I frequented an area flea market, naturally to search for prospective robot parts. One of the usual toy vendors that day had a small electric scooter – the Sharper Image ElectricX2, roughly Razor scooter sized. Needless to say, when I saw this thing, the proverbial light bulb probably went off with enough intensity to start fusing hydrogen. It was totally trashed, the batteries were gone (and the guy had no charger, manual, or other support equipment), so I got it for a few bucks.

The first thing I did when I got home was tear everything down for inspection. When I discovered that the airplane motor could swap into the stock scooter motor’s place with minimal modification, it was pretty much on.

I kept all the build reports for that scooter on my website if you want to browse through it.

How successful would you categorize that endeavor?

While the execution was shaky – literally, because I didn’t have access to machine tools like I do now, it was absolutely a success in how much it taught me about Electric Vehicle technology. Stuff like what batteries would work the best, what motor controllers, and places to mount components. Spec-ing out these things for an EV is a lot different than for a combat robot. It was what threw me into the world of EV and hybrid technology that I’m sort of pursuing now.

Since the scooter was actually wired up and finished a few days before I moved to Massachusetts, I brought it along with me to campus. It was hilarious, and a big hit with the other frosh. People never really expected an electric scooter to kick them off like that.

The other way it was a success was that it landed me my first (and still ongoing) on-campus job as an undergraduate research assistant for Smart Cities. They posted an opening for a team that will be designing and building a light electric vehicle, a (street-legal, Vespa-style) electric scooter. Vespa…Razor… close enough, right?

Part of what I enjoy about engineering is the degree to which you can engage yourself in learning a new skill. You HAVE to DO it. It’s not something that can be read out of a book and repeated. If you measure success by how much you have improved your condition, then Snuffles the First was one hell of an accomplishment in that it taught me things which I can’t get from just sitting in class.

From your site I gathered the Nickel Cadmium batteries powering the LOLrioKart are not your ordinary flashlight batteries. How powerful are these?

The large-format NiCd cells I ended up using in LOLrioKart were donations to our club from the Solar Electric Vehicle Team years ago. They were pretty tired batteries. Each pack comprises 11 cells, for a nameplate voltage of 13.2 volts. Problem is that nickel batteries are prone to developing internal crystalline parasitic structures that cause quick self-discharge, so many of the cells were just plain dead. I used a procedure called “zapping” to revive them. It pretty much boils down to injecting a massive high voltage and current spike into the battery in an instant, such that the crystals just vaporize.

Kind of like a heart defibrillator, except the “vaporize” part.

When new, big NiCds like this can easily dump a thousand amps in an instant and maybe a hundred or two amps for a while. For the uninitiated, 1,000 amps at 54 volts (the voltage of LOLrioKart’s 4 packs when charged), is 54,000 watts, which is very roughly the same power consumption as a thousand 60 watt household light bulbs, or about 72 electrical HP, if it were actually doing something useful.

Note that “instantaneous” is the key here. It takes only about 500 watts to keep the kart cruising at a constant speed. It only takes about 6-10 horsepower to keep a *real car* cruising at a constant highway speed, on flat ground.

Realistically, I think the cells have deteriorated to the point of only being able to burst-discharge a few hundred amps. Still not something you want to drop a wrench across. I really don’t have proper facilities to take care of batteries this large (chargers and battery managing equipment get very expensive at this scale), so all I’ve been able to do is charge and discharge them slowly – which doesn’t really help with reviving them all the way, since fast charge and discharge cycling is what helps batteries stop being stale. Regardless, the rest of my electrical system will not handle the cells at full flow.

So, if Ahmadinejad had access to these Iran probably still could not go nuclear?

Ahmadinejad could probably use one or two to power his lights in case he has to go hide somewhere, but he’ll need a few hundred thousand more if he actually wants to kick a reactor into shape with them.

What was the impetus for the name, LOLrioKart? Where there any other names that you seriously considered?

It was incredibly spontaneous. I had no idea how the project even spawned, but the name ‘LOLrioKart’ was the first and only name, inspired of course by the MarioKart games. Adding the scrambled syllable takes after the classic internet meme of “lollifying” things. You may have heard of “LOLlerskates”, “ROFLcopter”, “LMAOplane”, et al. from a few years back. That, too, was sort of
spur-of-the-moment.

How much practice did it take to be able to drive that puppy? In the video you make it look easy. Isn’t the center of gravity a tad high with you inside?

When you’re the builder and overseer of something, you kind of naturally get used to it due to being constantly with the construction and testing of the project. Piloting the kart during test runs wasn’t all that difficult when it was under control, but there were definitely a few moments where I thought somebody else was going to have to call home.

The kart’s center of gravity is actually very close to the ground. The battery pack in total weighs about 120 pounds, and it is all in a solid mass that is 3 inches above the ground. The motor and transmission in the back add another 30 pounds that isn’t much higher. I am not a heavy person, so sitting on top of all that probably raises the CoG only a few inches above the wheels. The kart does have substantial tilt when cornering at high speed due to the tires compressing, which amplifies the “I am about to roll over and die” effect.

How about the steering mechanism?

The kart steering is a simple “drag link” system commonly used on go-karts, except more aluminum-y. There’s no rack and pinion or hydraulics. It’s a simple mechanical linkage that transmits steering wheel movement one-for-one to the wheels. This means it’s very squirrely on the handling, and I had a pretty bad problem with slop in the whole steering shaft on an earlier build of the front end. This slop would cause the front wheels to not match the steering wheel angle often up to +/- 5 degrees. That doesn’t sound like much, but now just driving your car pretty fast and suddenly twitching the steering wheel a quarter turn. Then a quarter turn back. Not something you’d want on a busy street.

How do you actually stop the kart?

The short answer is that I stop it by willpower alone. Originally, I designed in a set of mechanical, cable-actuated band brakes for the front wheels. Electric motors have this cool feature that you can use them as electric brakes, and at the same time capture power back into your batteries. This is known as “regenerative braking”, and all the cool electric trains and hybrid cars do it. Because of this, I already had a really big brake on the rear axle – the drive motor. Adding a regular “sprocket brake” on it, like most simple karts have, was just redundant.

Problem was that these band brakes I spec’d out were for children’s toy electric scooters. The kind that go about 5 miles per hour. Long story short, they sort of vaporized on the first stop. I now know that you can get disc brake packages for mountain bikes and larger electric scooters. Guess what is coming in the mail soon?

So firing this baby up was truly a walk on the wild side?

The culmination of all of these safety non-features is that at one point in time I had a brakeless kart with a completely loose and sloppy steering linkage that was capable of exactly two speeds – zero and fast. I had recently blown a custom motor controller that I had built, and out of frustration, put the kart on “contactor control”. That’s just a very fancy way of saying “touch the battery wires to the motor.” On all 54 volts, the thing would kick up and wheelie on start and hold the front end in the air for two seconds, reaching some absurd speed in the meantime. After which, of course, I couldn’t really *STOP* the thing, and it would occasionally take off in a only slightly tangential path due to the steering slop. To slow that version, I would either just Flintstone it or perform an analogous maneuver that airliners use when approaching a runway and need to burn off speed – make little S-turns.

But no major crashes to this point?

The closest that I ever came to a real crash was when I made the mistake of closing the circuit making a turn. When the front end of the kart is off the ground, the steering is mysteriously missing. As soon as it crashes back down, of course, I am still attempting to be in the apex of a turn. The combination is that I sort of take a path midway between the two, which conveniently led to a curbside. It was a very elastic collision and I was certain the kart was going to catapult me out onto the ground, but somehow I landed back in.

That impact took out the right wheel and bent the 1/2″ hardened steel bolt that was the axle stub for it. The upward force of jumping the curb pretty much trashed the steering linkage and steering wheel mount. That’s when I finally had a good reason to rebuild it – the new setup includes a right-angle transmission that one, got rid of the slop and two, allowed me to add a gear ratio to the steering. It wasn’t much – only half a turn of the wheel from lock to lock, but oh boy was it a godsend compared to a quarter turn plus or minus an eighth.

I am still alive. Not sure how, but it feels okay. The two videos that I shot were well after these incidents, after the (variable speed) controller was refinished and the steering linkage made more solid.

But don’t mention the brakes.

Don’t know if you saw the results of the British study regarding the importance of what a man drives when it comes to impressing the ladies? What kind of reaction do you get from folks when you buzz by them in the rio? Is it attracting looks from members of the opposite sex?

One of the more depressing misconceptions about MIT is that, like many tech universities, it has an unbalanced gender ratio. This is patently untrue, and I am personally glad, since the actual ratio is near parity. The kart gets its fair share of attention from engineering women, but then again, I haven’t really tried using it as a chick magnet. I would attribute more of those reactions to novelty and “what on earth…” than anything else, though. Pretty much all of my female peers know about its existence and construction. A majority of them actually want to try driving it themselves, but due to the, ahem, health concerns, I have yet to let anyone else try.

General reactions to the kart have been diverse. If you’ve seen the videos, you have clearly seen people who don’t seem to notice it. Quite a few comments on other places where the kart has been featured seem to say that MIT students are jaded or ‘used to’ weird things flying/driving/crusing around. I would say that this is at least partially the truth, since there are many projects here which move around, and therefore the kart, while funny, isn’t really that weird.

For comparison, the DARPA Challenge guys occasionally take their autonomous forklift for a test spin. This is a 10-foot tall full-size pallet lift with dozens of sensor boxes, computers, spinning LIDAR rangefinders, cameras, and green underbody lighting hanging off it. Let me emphasize the fact that it is AUTONOMOUS. You don’t want to piss it off.

How about if you take it off-campus?

The reactions on the streets of Cambridge are much more varied. This is unsurprising, really, since outside of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge is just a suburb of Boston. I had more interested looks and people trying to catch the kart on their cell phone cameras when I wandered off the confines of the campus buildings.

The whole thing sort of reinforces my feeling that colleges in general tend to be little idyllic bubbles. The problem comes when people try to extrapolate the knowledge they gain in this bubble to the world at large, some times recklessly, in my opinion. I have gotten the impression that adults often think that college students are idealistic and naive, and I guess I can’t blame them. However, that
gets into politics of a completely different subject matter.

Any issues with the campus or Cambridge police? I wondered if someone might have been a bit unnerved at you bombing by them in this puppy and decided to call security?

At the end of the day, the campus police are around to maintain order and to make sure we don’t mire ourselves too deeply in the legal quicksand. Keeping people in line and enforcing every rule? Not so much. They’re pretty much all chill folk from my experience, and I’d conjecture that little oddities here and there make the workday all that more interesting. I have never yet had a problem with the CP with any of the club’s shenanigans.

I haven’t had enough encounters with Cambridge Police to really give an opinion, but have yet to get flagged or pulled over. My older peers tell me that they don’t mind unless you get really egregious (e.g. I start blowing red lights or driving the kart to work every day), because the history of being around MIT means It Can Happen Here™.

I tried to stick to every traffic rule that I could on the test runs. Not having turn signals, I used motorist hand signals. I did stop on red lights, and went on green ones. I would think at least part of the reason nobody ever called it in was because of this visage of sanity – instead of, you know, flying around at random.

So no speeding tickets? Hey can the cart really do 45 mph?

Nah, speeding was never a problem, since the kart maxed out at around 30 mph. Originally, yes, it was geared for the full 45, but I switched to a smaller sprocket on the motor because it… was, well, too suicidal.

I like my projects only *somewhat* suicidal.

What’s on the horizon for the LOLrioKart? Any other ideas about strapping brushless motors to other objects or other ideas percolating that we should be looking for down the road?

Up until now I considered LOLrioKart a terminal project – finished and done, time to move on. However, with the attention it has gotten, and the encouragement I’ve received from professors and peers, I’m going to see what part of my research I can integrate into it.

Remember that the work I do with the Media Lab is centered around electric vehicle technology. Part of what we are working on is a small, “foldable” compact urban vehicle. It features a lot of cutting-edge goodies, such as integrated in-wheel electric motor modules, steer-by-wire, lithium nanophosphate batteries, one-piece passenger shell, etc.

One of the ideas I had for the kart was constructing four wheel modules – each with their own internal motor – and mounting them to an updated subframe that has a suspension. The biggest shortcoming of the kart is that it’s a solid frame, which means every pothole they pave the streets here with goes straight into me. Not very fun.

While this would just be a go-kart with independent suspension, I also want to incorporate steer-by-wire into the wheel modules. The innovative feature in the car project is that each wheel can actually swivel up to 120 degrees, controlled by electronics. This is best explained with a picture.

Anyway, the bottom line is that I want to have a kart with four independently suspended, driven, and steered wheel modules. Fortunately, all the knowledge and experience I’ve been able to pick up because I work for them has gotten me to the point of being able to fabricate my own 3-phase brushless DC motors for the wheel modules, given some starting material (e.g. the hard-to-make-and-expensive-to-have-made laminated iron core that resides in most motors).

I’m pounding on the electronics side pretty hard now to learn how to make a functioning AC inverter for driving those motors. What this entails is essentially three of my custom DC motor drivers back-to-back, all controlled in a fancy cycle by one microprocessor such that I can do what amounts to moving something with my mind. Then I need to make four, then network them all.

Pretty freakin’ tall order, eh? Hell, I might even try to get this graded or something.

Sometimes you wish you had just applied yourself a bit more while in school. In fact, the folks at Gizmodo lay it all on the line:

When you were in college, you spent your free time drinking tallboys of Bud Ice and playing Mario Kart 64 until 5am.

Instead, an adventurous and yes, more serious MIT student has spent his time turning a standard shopping kart into the LOLrioKart. There is much more on the notion of choosing something other than longnecks for a good time at EqualsZero but here are some of the key elements:

……a whimsical attempt to strap a set of large nickel cadmium batteries (a cache of massive aircraft wet-cell NiCd batteries), discovered in a dusty back room, to something – anything……

……the logical progression from the insane electric vehicle project of yesteryear……an attempt to strap a massive brushless motor (a 15 horsepower brushless motor) to something – anything……

……a barrel of monkeys……

The Key Specs on LOLrioKart 1.0

Drivetrain: Midship-Rear 2WD

Hackermann steering geometry

Mechanical front brakes

Mechanical Welded steel tubing stock frame 6061, 2024 aluminum addenda

Motor: MARS Electric ME0201013001 (OEM brushless Etek) 15HP peak
Controller: 200 Amp Kelly BLDC KB72201 with regenerative braking
Battery: 54 volt giant nicads
Instrumentation: Dead Wreck-oning
Top Speed: 45MPH
Acceleration: ?!
Curb Weight: 350lb

Back to the folks at Gizmodo:

And you’ve got to assume that in Cambridge, seeing a motorized shopping cart with a nerd inside tooling around on the street isn’t all that shocking.

While we agree far too many us of spent way too much time with the tallboys, we are not so sure what the reaction might be when folks see this puppy coming at them. In fact, you just may want to make that judgment yourself.

For more on this wondrous little toy watch the YouTube video or explore the great fun these guys are having building and playing with the LOLrioKart at EqualsZero.

Great music and the not so subtle Ken and Barbie references reportedly had Mattel suing to take this one off the air:

Pepsi has had its share but this one with Michael J. Fox is brilliant right down to the entrance of roommate Danny – I thought this one was heading in a completely different direction at the end:

I wasn’t a real fan of the football playing horses until this beauty was released:

This one from Monster represents the ultimate in creativity – some of the single best lines ever uttered:

Larry Bird and Michael Jordan, two of the best to ever play the game and the two to take the shot with the game on the line – shooting for Big Mac:

Those young boys turn this sexy Crawford ad full circle:

Coke’s play on the Grand Theft Auto series, the complete antithesis of the game’s intent:

Seldom seen on anyone’s best ad list, this one offers yet another of the greatest lines of all time:

Often at the top of the best ads ever list, this one of course epitomizes creativity:

Recent interviews with former staffers point to his administration’s failed response to Hurricane Katrina as the tipping point. Still others point to the war in Iraq.

We disagree – the tipping point for our current president was not any single incident. Instead, it rested with the Internet’s wondrous new feature, YouTube.

The man who called himself “The Decider” had an amazing tendency to make poor decisions. He also had the propensity to act in a manner that reinforced his preconceived lack of intellect.

But most importantly, all of the man’s low-lights made it to the Internet where they were shared again and again. Here we present five beauties that certainly left America wondering how this man ever managed to become a two-term president.

The President on the Economy
Some of the videos took statements and mashed them together with other visuals to create an image. This one collects the many Bush statements related to the economy. While many other events defined the man’s presidency, many historians think the recent economic crisis will actually be the most talked about aspect of the presidency when all is said and done.

Sayings in Texas
Perhaps nothing catches the spirit of the missteps more than this short clip featuring our outgoing president’s many verbal missteps – gotta’ love the fool me once line that formed the ending of Fahrenheit 9/11.

Silence Is Not So Golden
Simply stated, it is hard to imagine that Kerry lost the election in 2004 after some less than memorable debate moments.

The Squint and the Smirk
For those who simply could not stand either the squint or the smirk that seemed to always find itself on display, Frank Caliendo’s appearance on Letterman was one to see. The disdain for the two facial quirks may have come from the very fact that this impersonator made it clear that both tendencies defined the man.

Ten Bush Moments
And our selection would not be complete without David Letterman’s Top Ten Bush Moments. Our favorite is the “left-hand now knows what the right hand is doing” though Dave’s number one likely best represents how many view the last eight years.

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

A name that should be familiar to almost anyone that’s picked up a game in the last 20 years, the Carmen Sandiego series lived long and prospered between the years 1985 and 2001, seeing multiple releases on most platforms that were around at the time. Kick-started by Brøderbund Software in 1985, the series was essentially a way to make the subject of Geography appear “hip and cool” to “the kids” by offering it up as a game, rather than something you learnt at school. Educational content was a staple of the series as you followed the trail of superthief Carmen Sandiego and her band of V.I.L.E (Villains’ International League of Evil) henchmen, with each new game in the series expanding the search across the globe and eventually including travelling through time as a viable option of pursuit.

Sim City

The beloved “city simulator” which has consumed more man-hours than sleep first started in 1989 and was made by Maxis and legendary game designer Will Wright . The premise behind the game (and every subsequent Sim City game) was to…Er…Simulate a city. More accurately, you assigned various zones (residential, industrial, commercial and the like) in which citizens would build related services and/or buildings. Eventually, after laying down water pipes, roads and power lines, you’d control the city in more indirect ways like managing the economy, politics, police and emergency services. This was the game to teach an entire generation or two that it wasn’t the “winning” that counts, but more the building an epic sprawling metropolis, only to destroy it by unleashing Godzilla upon it whilst laughing maniacally.

The Typing of the Dead

Everyone and – quite possibly – their mother has heard of Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, but have you heard of The Typing of the Dead? You might have, but it makes for a dramatic opening paragraph. Just in case you haven’t heard of it, it follows in the same educational vein as Mavis Beacon did, with the ultimate aim being to enhance your typing skills. Except with zombies. There’s an age-old saying that if you add zombies to something, it’ll make it infinitely better. Except oatmeal, I don’t imagine anything making that better. This genius of a game took the original House of the Dead 2 game and transposed the Mavis Beacon typing format over it, so in order to defeat the oncoming zombie hordes, the player had to type words that appeared on the screen, with each letter being a gunshot. Finishing a sentence was never quite so satisfying.

Windows Solitaire/Minesweeper

Solitaire was originally packaged with the Windows 3.0 (in 1990) operating system as a standard item, the aim of which was to ease users into getting to grips with the mouse-based control system, as up until then, the primary way to navigate was via a mixture of the DOS interface and keyboard shortcut commands. Suddenly people everywhere were getting used to basic mouse functions like drag-and-drop, double clicking and generally just moving the mouse about after a lifetime of near-total keyboard usage. Naturally this led to many problems in the workplace, as more and more people became hooked on the game, decreasing their work output exponentially and occasionally leading to firings. The same could be said of Minesweeper, with its number-based, spatial-awareness-promoting, speed-run-inducing simplicity.

Battle Chess

Perhaps arguably the best chess game ever, Battle Chess managed to turn a game as uneventful and boring (for then children and quite possibly anyone not really into chess these days) into an engaging and often exciting experience. Exactly as it sounds, it was normal chess…With battles. Both the sound and the pseudo-3D effects that were used were rather impressive for the time (1988, developed/published by Interplay). But more importantly, it made chess awesome (Or even more awesome, depending on your view of the game)!

Dope Wars

Whilst the subject matter might not have been the most politically correct of the lot; it was nevertheless an addictive and popular game. The player assumed the role of a drug dealer trying to earn a living by doing what he/she knows best, namely dealing drugs to everyone, quite possibly also children (dealing drugs to children, not dealing in children). On the surface it was a simple game of “making loads of cash by being bad”, but subconsciously it taught valuable life-skills like budgetary management, being able to forecast a financial market, the importance of supply and demand and how much a kilo of crack costs in New York.

Granny’s Garden

Billed as an “educational adventure game” and released in 1983 for the BBC Micro (it was also ported to such retro stalwarts as the Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64 and the ZX Spectrum), this game had you out on a quest to save the children of the King and Queen of the Kingdom of Mountains, whilst all the while avoiding some random evil witch whose motive for being evil was probably just because she felt like being really irritating at the time. Most of the puzzles involved were logic-based, others could be quite bizarre and random, but overall the game was a light-hearted puzzle-fest most notable for its awesome music.

Syndicate

This was a fantastic SF strategy/action isometric game. Syndicate (which later became a series of games) was released in 1994 by those bastions of excellence, Bullfrog. It was set in a dystopian future in which corporations fought for dominance over the global population by using cyborg agents, which was pretty cool. The game saw you as an executive from a corporation in command of a team of cyborgs and your job was to carry out various missions on behalf of said corporation, by any means necessary, usually by killing and destroying everything in your path. The game had a distinct SF/Cyberpunk flavor, which many found to be appealing; along with the resource/research management aspect of the game, with regards to if you ran out of funding for your agents/equipment/tech research, you were in big trouble. It was also good for improving geography skills, as you strategically planned to dominate the entire globe, country by country.

Yet the thought of a computer purchase brings about the ongoing debate: do I go Mac? Or is a PC the best option? Truly, this discussion has no simple right answer, but there are some key points to consider when making the choice.

Operating System Software – It Depends
There is little doubt that the number of applications available for Windows-based machines exceeds the possibilities for a Mac. The experts at Switched.com offer this simple statement: “Windows is the operating system for games — most popular titles, ‘Halo,’ ‘Bioshock,’ and ‘Crysis’ aren’t available on Mac or Linux.” Likewise, “uTorrent (the best BitTorrent client out there for peer-to-peer filesharing of movies, TV shows, and the like) is also Windows-only.”

Clearly, Mac is making major inroads in the software arena in virtually all other arenas outside of the gaming industry. Switched.com insists that “Macs excel at creative tasks, such as music creation, photo editing, and video production” Add to that, a substantial library of software such as iTunes, iLife, and Garage Band, that are shipped with every Mac” and it is easy to see why so many are firmly behind the Mac as the way to go.

Here there appear to be two clear divisions, if you are into gaming, then a PC is in the cards. If you are more into music, video, and the graphic arts, then a Mac is the machine for you.

Internet Attacks – Edge Mac
While there are more applications available for a Windows-based machine, there is little doubt that your PC will be exposed to an endless number of viruses and spyware that are targets of the Windows operating system. If you are buying a PC, then you will need the latest and best computer software protection available. And yet, you still might get zapped.

Macs are currently relatively free of the viruses and spyware that plague Windows users. There is the likelihood that fact could change down the road but currently Mac users face far fewer issues with downtime or file problems due to viruses and spyware.

Speed – Edge Mac
A recent set of tests by Popular Mechanics revealed PCs utilizing the Vista system to be remarkably more sluggish than Macs operating with Leopard. In various speed trials, PM noted that “Leopard OS trounced Vista in all-important tasks such as boot-up, shutdown and program-launch times.” In addition, when PM tested Vista on a Mac using Apple’s platform-switching Boot Camp, the “Apple computers ran Vista faster” than the PCs did.

Aesthetics – Edge Mac

When it comes to aesthetics, Switched.com gives the definite edge to Mac. “Simplicity, consistency, security, and good design count for a lot in the computer realm” so if you are “new to computing, want minimal hassle, and just need to get to work right away without having to wait two minutes or more for your PC to boot-up, then a Mac is for you.”

The general consensus is that Macs have it all over PCs when it comes to look and feel. Switched.com adds, “everything from the elegant look of the desktop and the innovative designs to the satisfying click the keyboard makes when you type on it makes the Mac a pleasant experience for just about anyone.”

Price – Edge PC
While there are exceptions, if price is your bottom line, then the general consensus is you will get far more bang for your buck with a PC. The major particular difference is when seeking options at the low end of the cost spectrum. For under $600 you will find a wealth of PC options. For a Mac, you will be hard-pressed to find anything other than the mini-Mac for such a price.

At times, though, this low-end pricing can be an example of “you get what you pay for.” Switched.com noted that PCs can “vary widely in terms of basic build quality.” In addition, when you move towards the upper end, it can be more expensive for a PC to match the software options for a Mac. But to purchase a Mac, you will need to be ready to outlay at least $1,000 for either a laptop or desk model.

Intangibles – It Depends
Your area of study and career choice should also factor into your decision. If you plan to work in the graphic arts field or any of the number of creative fields related to photography, music, or video production, we have already noted that Mac should be your choice. Yet in the business world, there is still a clear advantage to PCs. The folks at Money.CNN.com note that “major compatibility issues still lurk” and even though “Macs consistently excelled at running Microsoft Office,” the most utilized tool for business “Excel on the Mac is just awful.”

If we still haven’t given you enough cause for one over the other, Switched.com offers what just might be the clincher to go Mac. “Unlike Windows-based PCs, Macs can also run Windows using a program called Parallels Desktop or Bootcamp.” In simplest terms, theoretically you just might have access to the best of both worlds with a Mac.

Flickr photos courtesy of paperocks a.k.a. evalinda, Paul Watson, n8kowald, and Erik Eckel.

1. You need a perfect SAT score to get into an Ivy League school.
2. You need a perfect GPA to get into an Ivy League school.
3. Your perfect SAT score will get into an Ivy League school.
4. Your perfect GPA will get you into an Ivy.
5. Your perfect GPA and SAT score will get you into an Ivy League school.
6. If you have what it takes (in 1-5), “second tier” schools will offer you scholarships to join their programs.
7. Public colleges are cheaper than private colleges.
8. Obsessing over grades in high school is worth the hassle because you’re guaranteed admission to your favorite school.
9. Ivy League universities provide education unsurpassed by local, public, or smaller schools.
10. Rankings mean everything to a school and should be considered in your college decision-making.
11. It’s best to attend the most prestigious university you’re accepted to.
12. You should join 30 clubs for quantity instead of focusing on building up a credible reputation in one or two solid extracurricular activities.
13. Students coming from unfortunate financial situations are lucky because they’ll be offered a full ride to the colleges of their choice.
14. Applying to schools without financial need increases your chances of acceptance.
15. All in-state colleges are safety schools.
16. Valedictorians and salutatorians will get into any schools they apply to.
17. Colleges look down on students who take the ACT in comparison to the SAT.
18. You must have accumulated community service hours to be considered for college admissions.
19. Ivy League schools are full of people who are rich.
20. If you’re deferred, that means you’ll have no chance of getting into the school.
21. There is one school out there that fits you perfectly.
22. Having family who are alumni will guarantee your admissions into schools more so than having good scores.
23. If you don’t get into the school of your choosing, your life is over.

What can you add to this list?

Actor in a Leading Role
George Clooney (Michael Clayton): George Clooney attended Northern Kentucky University and the University of Cincinnati but did not graduate from either school. In his early years, Clooney attended the Blessed Sacrament School in Ft. Mitchell, Kentucky, St. Michael’s School in Columbus, Ohio, and the Western Row and St. Susanna schools in Mason, Ohio. He then graduated from Augusta High School in Kentucky.
Daniel Day-Lewis (There Will Be Blood): At a young age, Daniel Day-Lewis was known to be a little wild. His parents sent him to to the Sevenoaks School boarding school in England, which he hated. Afterwards, he transferred to a public school called Bedales. His big break came from his education at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School.
Johnny Depp (Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street): Depp is a high school dropout who initially had aspirations to be a rock star. He actually attempted to return to school but his principal told him to follow his musical dream.
Tommy Lee Jones (In the Valley of Elah): Tommy Lee Jones has a presidential-studded education. He attended the same high school (Robert E. Lee in Midland, Texas) as First Lady Laura Bush. He then attended preparatory school St. Mark’s School of Texas and then was accepted to Harvard University on a scholarship. There, he was roommates with (future) Vice President Al Gore. He was also a Harvard football star and graduated cum laude with an English degree in 1969.
Viggo Mortensen (Eastern Promises): After traveling between Europe and America (New York), Mortensten earned a bachelor’s degree in Spanish from St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York. He claims that he took an easy courseload because he wanted to be in many plays during his college career.

Actor in a Supporting Role
Casey Affleck (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford): Pictured on the left, Affleck attended the George Washington University and later transferred to Columbia University where he got degrees in astronomy, physics, and Western philosophy.
Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men): Bardem made his first debut at the age of six. You can imagine that his schooling wasn’t as normal as the rest of ours.
Philip Seymour Hoffman (Charlie Wilson’s War): Hoffman, right, has a bachelor of fine arts degree in drama from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, where he graduated in 1989.
Hal Holbrook (Into the Wild): Holbrook graduated from the Culver Academies preparatory school in Indiana, followed by Denison University in Ohio.
Tom Wilkinson (Michael Clayton): An English native, Wilkinson graduated from the University of Kent and attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.

Actress in a Leading Role
Cate Blanchett (Elizabeth: The Golden Age): Blanchett attended primary school in Melbourne at Ivanhoe East Primary School, followed by a secondary education at Methodist Ladies’ College (also in Melbourne) where she began pursuing her interest in acting. She studied economics and fine art at the University of Melbourne and ultimately finished her studies in 1992 at the National Institute of Dramatic Art.
Julie Christie (Away From Her): Christie studied at a convent school in England and was expelled shortly thereafter. She followed her education at a boarding school for girls called Wycombe Court. Eventually, she studied at the Central School of Speech and Drama which is part of the University of London.
Marion Cotillard (La Vie en Rose): The French actress doesn’t have any education history, as she’s been acting since she’s a child!
Laura Linney (The Savages): After graduating from Northfield Mount Hermon School (in Massachusetts) in 1982, Linney attended Northwestern University, then transferred to Brown University, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 1986. She then continued her acting studies at the Juilliard School.
Ellen Page (Juno): Pictured at left, Page attended the Halifax Grammar School until grade 10 and graduated from the Shambhala School (a preschool-highschool program) in 2005.

Actress in a Supporting Role
Cate Blanchett (I’m Not There): Just as stated before, Blanchett attended primary school in Melbourne at Ivanhoe East Primary School, followed by a secondary education at Methodist Ladies’ College where she began pursuing her interest in acting. She studied economics and fine art at the University of Melbourne and ultimately finished her studies in 1992 at the National Institute of Dramatic Art.
Ruby Dee (American Gangster): Pictured at right, Dee is a 1945 graduate of Hunter College and received degrees in French and Spanish. She is also a member of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority.
Saoirse Ronan (Atonement): Born in 1994, Ronan is still attending school in Ireland.
Amy Ryan (Gone Baby Gone): Ryan never went to college. She was hired for a Broadway performance right out of high school.
Tilda Swinton (Michael Clayton): Swinton, who is from Great Britain, attended West Heath Girls’ School, and then went to Fettes College, a boarding schoo, until she took a break. She graduated from a women’s college, the New Hall at Cambridge University with a degree in Social and Political Sciences in 1983.

The George Washington University in the United States. In the heart of Washington DC, GWU affords students the opportunity to take advantage of becoming political figures and more. Freshman dorms have housekeeping service. Commencement is held on the White House ellipse. Annual Tuition: $39,240

Kenyon College in Ohio (also the United States) is a small school with 1,600 students total and 176 members of the faculty. It is the oldest liberal arts college in Ohio and was founded in 1824. Annual Tuition: $38,140

Bucknell University in Pennsylvania (United States) is the nation’s largest liberal arts college with 3,400 undergraduates. Annual Tuition: $38,134

Vassar College in New York (United States) is a former “Seven Sister” (all woman’s school) but now is coeducational. The student to faculty ratio is 9:1. Annual Tuition: $38,115

Sarah Lawrence College in New York (United States) is a predominantly women’s college that focuses on performing arts in addition to a well-rounded liberal arts education. And guess what? You don’t need to submit SAT scores to be accepted. Annual Tuition: $38,090

Quest University Canada in Canada is less than a year old having opened in September of 2007. It is a private non-denominational university that offers a single degree: a Bachelors of Arts and Sciences. Only 80 students attend, taking one class at a time in 18-day blocks. The appeal? You don’t see many private universities in Canada. Annual Tuition: $23,420

American University of Paris in France is a liberal arts and science institution that neighbors the Eiffel Tower. Annual Tuition: $34,725

University of Buckingham in the United Kingdom is the only fully private university in all of the UK and was founded in the 1970s. The school offers degree programs in a total of two, not four, years. Annual Tuition: $30,400 for Brits, $52,800 for international residents

Aoyama Gakuin University in Japan (Asia) was founded over a century ago by Methodist Episcopal missionaries. It is part of an educational institute that begins instilling academic values in kindergarten, followed by elementary school, junior/senior high school, and eventually, college. Annual Tuition: $11,700 to $16,100

Bond University in Australia. Founded in 1989, this school boasts small classes and has a very high percentage of foreign students. Annual Tuition: $32,900

American University of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates (Middle East). Only slightly over a decade old (the university was founded in 1997), the university is broken up into smaller schools that focus on business, architecture, engineering, and arts and sciences. Courses are taught in English but university assures us that culture is highly Arabic. Annual Tuition: $16,770

Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey in Mexico. Founded in 1943 by a Mexican businessman, this is one of Mexico’s most respected universities. Annual Tuition: $11,210

Now let’s ask this question: did you go to any of these expensive schools? Are they more prestigious than the “competition?”